


do not take me from your laughter

by mllevangogh



Category: Pacific Rim (2013)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-12
Updated: 2013-12-12
Packaged: 2018-01-04 10:10:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,148
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1079721
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mllevangogh/pseuds/mllevangogh
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>On the coast of Siberia is a village called Kizel. It is a miserable, tired town, consisting of a few thatched houses, some shops, a meager post office. It is cold always; the sky is always grey and the snow is always falling.  It is here that Sasha is born, in a little whitewashed house with four rooms and a central stove to keep it warm.  It is also here that she will see her first kaiju.</p>
<p>Or, Sasha's origins.</p>
            </blockquote>





	do not take me from your laughter

**Author's Note:**

> Brief mention of rape that can be triggering, so take care of yourself. Does not fit within the extended canon of Pacific Rim (i.e., it fits the movie, nothing else.) Have fun!

_Take bread away from me, if you wish,_  
take air away, but  
do not take from me your laughter.

\- Pablo Neruda

On the coast of Siberia is a village called Kizel. It is a miserable, tired town, consisting of a few thatched houses, some shops, a meager post office. It is cold always; the sky is always grey and the snow is always falling. It is here that Sasha is born, in a little whitewashed house with four rooms and a central stove to keep it warm. It is also here that she will see her first kaiju.

It is December. Sasha spends most of her time chopping wood and hunting. Her family has long been self-sufficient because everything is so far away, so hard to get to, so unreliable. Things break while they're shipped there, food goes bad. Everything is slightly stale in Sasha's world. Sasha hunts because her father is ill and her brother Peter is dead. Her father has seizures and no one knows why. The doctor had taken all of their money to come out and see him, and he'd left them with nothing, not even answers.

She is strong, has always been strong. At sixteen she could lift her father in her arms, carrying him about the village, running errands. The doctor said fresh air would be good for him. Everything tastes like salt in Kizel, rippling off the sea. 

When she is twenty, she dreams of going far from her home. But her family needs her and she is better than leaving. Her mother says she should get married, but that is one thing she cannot sacrifice to them. She will keep herself at least.

When she turns twenty-two, she experiences two miracles. First, her father begins to get better. Second, she sees her first kaiju. It is the kind with tentacles. She is out along the frigid coast, looking at the sea. She goes here to think, when everyone is loud and she has no thoughts other than Please, no, be quiet. 

But there is a ripple in the sea, far, far out, just a speck on the horizon. She looks closely and sees one tiny hair of a tentacle rise, and she knows it is coming for them. She is running before she knows what she is doing. She sprints the half mile to her house, screaming, her throat raw.

"We have to leave!" she screams, rushing to the packs she has kept ready, just in case. She picks her father up easily. He is already wheezing from the stress. Sasha has never learned to drive the one old car her family owns, because where is there to drive to? It had been inherited from her grandmother. For as long as she has been alive, Sasha cannot remember anyone driving it, except perhaps once. But her mother is in shock and her father, despite his improved health, has legs as thin as twigs. So she drives anyway, thinking that death by car is better than death by kaiju. The car is not meant for the poor, rocky roads of Kizel, but Sasha has no choice. She drives with her foot on the floor, watching the beast in the rearview mirror. She watches the kaiju come ashore, washing a tidal wave over her town, crushing it with its massive limbs. Sasha drives until she cannot see the sea, until the car gives out, sputtering to a stop in the middle of farmland. When she turns around, she notices that her father has died. 

***

She burns his body by the side of the road. Her mother is consolable. 

"Weep and die, Mama," Sasha says harshly, but the words fall upon deaf ears. Sasha pulls her mother along, carrying both their packs on her strong shoulders. They walk for miles until they stumble upon a farm house, the same color as the dull grey sky. Anya Polikoff, the proprietor of the farm, is a tight-bunned woman with skin like warm earth. 

Sasha wipes the blood from her nose, her chapped cheeks. Her mother slumps on Sasha's shoulder, looking grey everywhere, in her eyes, in her skin. She looks more ash than person. Sasha address Anya directly, without a tremor in her voice.

"Pardon me, ma'am. May we come in?"

***

Sasha wants to leave the next day, but her mother is comatose. Anya says they can stay until her mother is well again. 

"She will never be well again," says Sasha matter-of-factly, and she knows it to be true. She knows it in her bones. 

Sasha's mother dies a week later, her face as grey as everything else. Sasha burns her body, too, because he ground is too hard to dig. That night at dinner, she asks Anya one final favor: a drive to the train station, and a few rubles for the train to Moscow. It is the last time Anya hears of her for twelve years. The next time she sees her face, it is on the news, announcing her death. 

***

In Moscow, Sasha joins the army. She trains her already strong muscles to become impenetrable. She forces herself to obey. She is nearly dismissed for kissing, and then punching her immediate superior, a fool named Willy, but Willy insists it was his fault. (It was, of course.) 

Sasha gets a reputation for being a bitch and, later, a slut. She'd made the mistake of sleeping with another trainee, which is only a mistake because he brags about it to everyone. Sasha has never had a boyfriend, but she knows plenty about sex. The only thing she cannot fathom is why it is made into a noteworthy event. 

And then, in the middle of the night, one of the privates, Andrevich, crawls on top of her, reeking of sweat and vodka, and pulls her fatigues down past her hips. His cock is hard and wet already, seeking the space between her legs when she kicks him in the chest and elbows him in the nose, breaking it. The lights are coming on as everyone hears him give a shout. Andrevich punches her in the face once before she knocks him out and spits on his face as he lies unconscious.

She is kicked shortly after that. Sitting in the Captain's office, bruise blooming on her cheek and knuckles covered in blood, the Captain takes pity on her.

"I like you, Sasha," he says, and she grimaces.

"I have heard that before," she spits, and he smiles wanly. 

"I want to help you," he tries again, and Sasha flares with anger.

"I don't need your help!" she explodes, face becoming blotchy. "I came here by myself, I saved myself, I knocked that withered worm unconscious, I saved myself!" 

"Sasha," says the Captain finally, after a long pause. "go to Hong Kong. There's a program there you might be interested in."

Sasha starts to argue, what makes you think I'd want to - but then he lowers his voice and seals the deal. "It's fighting kaiju, Sasha."

Sasha goes to Hong Kong. 

***

His name is Aleksis. He is always laughing in the way that only young men can. He laughs even when she loses her cool while sparring, poking him in the beefy throat with her staff. He coughs out a chuckle that makes Sasha's blood boil. Tabernacle says he wants to test him as her partner.

"Sir," she protests, hating how thick her accent sounds, even after all this time. Aleksis has no accent; but then again, he learned English at school, a luxury Sasha could not afford.

Tabernacle is unmoved. "Aleksis," he repeats firmly. "You'll try it with him."

"I hate him," Sasha says fiercely, only a little dishonestly. She hates his laugh, which is close enough.

"Fine," says Tabernacle. "Don't fight, then."

But he and she both know that fighting is Sasha's only true skill, her only natural proclivity. She accepts Aleksis as her partner through gritted teeth.

***

Aleksis comes to her door that night. 

"We don't train until tomorrow," she snaps at him by way of greeting. He, of course, laughs.

"I am not afraid of you, Sasha." He leans in close, his breath on her face. "There is greatness here. Can't you feel it?"

Sasha pauses for a moment, inhaling deeply. "The only thing I feel," she retorts, "is your revolting breath on my face." She slams the door. She can hear his laughter as it floats down the hallway.

***

The thing about training with Aleksis is that he somehow trusts her implicitly. He does not feel the need to test her - he knows when she is right. They move in tandem, their bodies matching. Tabernacle looks on smugly.

After, Aleksis ices his tricky left knee, sitting on the bench. Sasha approaches, arms crossed.

"What is wrong with you?" she demands in English. She does not like to use Russian with him. She believes it is an honor he will earn. "Why do you trust me?"

Aleksis laughs, a short but forceful HA. "That's what's wrong with me? That I trust my partner?"

"Partner-in-training," Sasha corrects stubbornly. "You don't even know me!" 

Aleksis shrugs, like it doesn't matter. "You've never punched me," he says, like it's obvious. Sasha stares. "Or kicked me, or bashed my teeth in, or otherwise wounded me."

Sasha is flabbergasted. "What," she says blankly. "Only because you haven't insulted me, or attacked me, or - or tried to rape me, or - " She falters. 

Aleksis looks serious. "You trust me too," he says, in Russian, and Sasha ignores the way her pulse suddenly quickens. She can hear her heart in her ears. Sasha goes on, not even looking smug. He's looking at her curiously. She hates him. 

"You trust me because you know I would never do any of those things." He stands, body looming over hers. She inhales sharply.

"Never," he repeats, this time in Russian, putting his hand on her cheek. He leaves, not laughing for the first time since she's known him.

Sasha tells Tabernacle she will agree to drift with Aleksis.

***

She is nervous, but she hides it well. She makes her way to the tech center, wearing her slick black suit. She sees Aleksis laughing with Newt about something, and it doesn't annoy her as much as it should. She approaches them.

"I want to start," she says in her choppy English, and Newt's eyes widen. 

"Yeah, 'course, hang on," he stammers, and scuttles away. Aleksis takes her in, all five feet, ten inches of restrained fury, and smiles gently. 

"You're nervous," he says, and she does not try to deny what she knows he knows. He will know it in a few minutes, anyway. She only shrugs, and he only smiles. 

"Let's drift," she says, in Russian, and his grin broadens. 

"Let's drift," he agrees.

***

His presence is different than she expects. He is light and feathery in her mind as they dance through her memories. She sees her mother's grey face and her father's eyes, rolled back into his head. She sees her town on fire. She feels the weight of Andrevich upon her, the nausea as she pulls her clothes straight, the crunch of his cartilage under her elbow. But this time Aleksis is there, warm and bright in the back of her mind. She feels Andrevich's fist on her cheekbone. 

It's time to move on, says Aleksis, and she goes with him, leaving herself behind.

She sees Aleksis in his house, ten times the size of hers. She feels Mrs. Kaidanovsky kiss Aleksis's face. She feels loved and safe. And then it is replaced by fear, sudden and quick, and she feels like a deer, stupid and fleet. Aleksis's father is screaming, face purple. Mrs. Kaidanovsky is cowering, a purple welt on her face,blood on her lip. Sasha feels the weight of a scream in her chest, the weight of his father's blow on his cheek. Aleksis pushes, screaming. Sasha feels it in her own throat. She hums gently, Aleksis. She feels her breath even, her pulse slow. The memory melts away. 

There is a puppy, a loud clap of thunder, the slice of a knife into ribs. A surgery. There is more now, parts Sasha remembers too, but from the other way around. The distinction is irrelevant now. Aleksis watches her move gracefully, her muscles dancing beneath her skin, feels the need in his bones, muscles. He loves her, Sasha realizes. His hand on her face last night, his fingers on the underside of her wrist, Aleksis in his room, alone, smiling to himself, thinking of the way her bones meet. The way he laughs only around her, like that, at least. Sasha feels the absurdity and beauty of it in her lungs, bubbling. 

When the drift finally ends, she looks at him, feeling him in her veins. And for the first time in years, Sasha laughs. 

***


End file.
